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Retro Me Sathana (1848) or Get Thee Behind Me, Satan, was initially a painting project which Dante Gabriel Rossetti started in 1947 and later had to abandon. The curator of the National Gallery, Charles Eastlake, did not favour the project, perhaps due to its Satanic invocations. It is worth mentioning here that ‘Retro Me Sathana’ is a latin quotation from the Gospel of St Luke; it’s English translation is from King James’ Bible. Somehow the unfinished painting has been transformed into this beautiful Sonnet XLII, first published in the House of Life (1869).

Get thee behind me. Even as, heavy-curled,
Stooping against the wind, a charioteer
Is snatched from out his chariot by the hair,
So shall Time be; and as the void car, hurled
Abroad by reinless steeds, even so the world:
Yea, even as chariot-dust upon the air,
It shall be sought and not found anywhere.
Get thee behind me, Satan. Oft unfurled,

Thy perilous wings can beat and break like lath
Much mightiness of men to win thee praise.
Leave these weak feet to tread in narrow ways.
Thou still, upon the broad vine-sheltered path,
Mayst wait the turning of the phials of wrath
For certain years, for certain months and days.

18th Century Translations

The Arabian Nights’ Entertainments (1706-21) is the very first translation in English of A Thousand and One Nights. It was translated from Antoine Galland’s Les Mille et Une Nuits (1704-17) by an anonymous ‘Grub Street’ translator. Antoine Galland, a French scholar well-read in languages, is generally considered the European discoverer of the Arabic manuscript which was itself a translation of combined tales in Persian, Indian and other languages.

The English translator, despite producing a superb translation lasting unchallenged for over a century, remains anonymous to this day. His choice of title as The Arabian Nights’ Entertainments, rather than A Thousand and One Nights, is very significant as it from the start represented the book as something very different from what it really was. This also began a naming tradition of the book that all succeeding nineteenth-century translators have preserved even though each of them claimed…

The two volumes of The World as Will and Representation are Schopenhauer’s most important work and his complete philosophy. Surprisingly written in his twenties, this comprehensive work covers all aspects of life and known fields of knowledge to civilisation in the early nineteenth-century; from his critique of Hegel and hailing of Kant to supporting his argument with elements from Buddhism and neuroscience. His philosophy can be summed up in this quote: ‘The will-to-live does not appear in consequence of the world, but the world appears in consequence of the will-to-live (V.II, 360).

Schopenhauer talks about two kinds of will, one includes the other: the will of the world and the will of the individual which is also part of the will of the world. The will of the world represents itself in all forms of life on earth, including human beings. In other words, all forms of existence are a demonstration of the world to be or of matter to live. To Schopenhauer, this is the prime causer of conscious existence (human beings) as well as non-conscious existence, and continues to be the prime mover of all living organisms and their ultimate instinct: survival. The second will Schopenhauer assesses is the will of the human being which is both an individual will by itself and also the universe’s most successful attempt at representing its will: being a conscious form of life. Unlike the will which is always subjective to the universe and/or the individual, representation can be objective as well as subjective; Objective in being an object existing by itself (though still in representation of the will) and independent from conception, and subjective when perceived by the human mind or other living organisms (animals) which can perceive but are incapable of forming concepts. Other forms of the subjectivity of representation could be argued as Schopenhauer himself mentions, such as the secondary representation of the individual’s conception of the universe, but these infinite replications of the Platonic ideal are not Schopenhauer’s concern.

Schopenhauer’s is the most logical fundamental philosophy I have come across and one that has from the beginning gained my attention and agreement with its argument. Having said that, there are several issues I am having with it. One of which is his soft spot towards what he perceived as genuine Indian religions, namely Hinduism, Brahmanism and Buddhism as opposed to his unjustified aggressiveness toward Islam and disliking of Judaism. At one occasion he mentions, ‘atheistic Buddhism is much more closely akin to Christianity than are optimistic Judaism and its variety, Islam (V. II, 444).’ The named above Indian religions have, without doubt, contributed heavily to Schopenhauer’s philosophy, especially when linking concepts such as reincarnation to the infinite cycle of representation. Nevertheless, at times Schopenhauer enthusiastically praises India and gives it credit for groundless achievements. For instance he asserts that Christianity as a doctrine ‘is Indian in spirit, and therefore, more than probably, Indian in Origin, although only indirectly, through Egypt (V.II, 488).’ Not only does this claim an incorrect and unsupported history of Christianity, but it also claims bizarrely that Egypt, the oldest known civilisation in the world, is Indian or India-influenced at the least. On the other hand, Schopenhauer aligns himself with Christianity in a way that undermines the independent superiority of his philosophy.

I wish perhaps to try to resolve the deepest mystery of Christianity, namely that o the Trinity, into the fundamental conceptions of my philosophy […]. The Holy Ghost is the decided denial of the will-to-live; the person in whom this exhibits itself in concerto is the Son. He is identical with the will that affirms life, and thereby produces the phenomenon of this world of perception, i.e., with the Father, in so far as affirmation and denial are opposite acts of the same will (V. II, 629).

Not only is he aligning his philosophy with Christianity here to add to its weight, but in doing so he is also saving Christianity from its opaque mysticism. The Trinity are translated into direct and simple symbols to the essence of life: Will and its consequences.

Schopenhauer’s style is akin to the classical fathers in its simplicity and directness; something which he consciously achieves being opposed to the verbosity of many German philosophers known in his time and particularly Hegel. This makes him one of the easiest modern philosophers to read. His philosophy though borrows from religions and science, carrying over some mistakes from both, stands high and aloof above any faith or philosophy. Its fundamental achievement is in regarding the world comprehensively and logically without superfluous complexity, and spiritually without mystery or mysticism.

The Reviewed translations from German are:

Schopenhauer, Arthur. The World as Will and Representation, VI. Trans. by Alistair Welchman and Christopher Janaway (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014).

This is a superb translation with a lot of explanations, commentary and footnotes; very helpful in understanding the context of Schopenhauer’s philosophy and his multifarious references to all fields of knowledge. This translation is also sufficient for getting a basic grasp on Schopenhauer’s philosophy and comes with a supplementary consisting of his critique of Kant’s philosophy. I look forward to the publication of the Cambridge translation of volume II.

Schopenhauer, Arthur. The World as Will and Representation, VII. Trans. by E.F.J. Payne (New York: Dover Publications, 1966) – a reprint of The Falcon’s Wing Press edition of 1958.

This translation is equally excellent though it lacks the commentary of the newer translation and its fluidity. Having said that, this remains a masterpiece from its time and currently the best published second volume translation available. I particularly like the italicising of the conceptual phrases; something which the newer translation has adopted. I also like the use of Schopenhauer’s references and quotes in their original languages within the translated text, while translating them in the footnotes.

Note on my use of quotes:

To the critical reader, it may seem inadequate that I have quoted Schopenhauer only from his second volume. I only did so as he goes over many of the topics he discusses in the first volume in his second. It seemed to me more appropriate to quote him from his latest and most developed work while I was writing this review.

A Woman of No Importance is a short entertaining play of four acts, by Oscar Wilde. Lord Illingworth, the main protagonist of the play, reminds me a lot of Lord Henry Wotton in The Picture of Dorian Gray. Indeed his views and philosophy of life echo many of those mentioned in Dorian Gray. He and the rest of the featured aristocracy in the play represent the morally degenerated elite of English society and how dehumanising English and European (French novels mentioned) modernism has become. Hester, the American puritan novelist, on the other hand, stands for the purity and the morality England has lost to attain its condemned modernity. Hester visits England as a descendant of a generation which left England to America three hundred years ago, and after being shocked and insulted by English aristocratic modernity, she decides to leave, taking back with her to America the only two pure characters in the play -who also represent the last of the purity of England. This is a sign of the irredeemability of England’s immorality and the doomed irreversibility of its monstrous modernity.

The Arabian Nights’ Entertainments is the very first translation in English of A Thousand and One Nights (1706-21). It was translated from Antoine Galland’s Mille et Une Nuit (1704-17) by an anonymous ‘Grub Street’ translator. Antoine Galland, a French scholar well-read in languages, is generally considered the European discoverer of the Arabic manuscript which was itself a translation of combined tales from Persian and Indian languages. The English translator, in spite of producing a superb translation lasting unchallenged for over a century, remains anonymous to this day. His choice for the title as The Arabian Nights’ Entertainments rather than A Thousand and One Nights is very significant as it has from the start represented the book as something very different from what it really is. This also begins a naming tradition of the book which all succeeding nineteenth-century translators have preserved even though each of them claimed to be directly translating from original manuscripts.
The Arabian Nights’ Entertainments has been produced at a time when Europe was reconnecting with its medieval past through an unquenchable thirst for fairy tales, something which has massively contributed to the translation’s instantaneous success. It was even very popular amongst culturally influential figures such as Walter Scott, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Benjamin Disraeli and Charlotte Bronte. Its stories are alluded to in their work, its plot imitated, and its themes and characters adopted and reincarnated.

The stories of The Nights are based within the frame of the story of Scheherazade. Prince Schahriar, having been betrayed by his first wife, decides that all women are ‘unchaste’. He marries a new bride every night and has her beheaded when the first beam of dawn appears in the sky. It is Scheherazade’s turn to marry the prince, and to avoid a similar fate to her predecessors, she devises the trick of telling the prince a new story every night. Her stories do not end by the end of the night, but become rather the starts of new stories to be told the following nights. Schahriar’s interest in the new story she promises to tell the following night, saves Scheherazade’s head from the executioner’s scimitar at every break of dawn. Some of the popular stories told by Scheherazade to Schahriar, including Aladdin and Alibaba and the Forty Thieves, are not based on the Arabic manuscript but are rather pseudo-translations devised by Galland to complete a thousand stories for the thousand nights he appears to have taken literally.
For over a century this version of The Arabian Nights has continued to be the sole representative of the people it has been given their name in the English language. Subsequent translations could only attempt to get beyond its centrality by exaggerating its stories and excessively annotating them. Its intimate scenes and sexual references have awed and offended its readers. Nevertheless its endless chain-like narrative has never stopped to inspire authors, artists and politicians, and its prisoner queen has been the subject of wild British dreams and illicit aspirations.

Studies of the Western representations of the ‘Orient’ reached their peak in the eighties and the nineties of the past century and they continue to be highly influential today. In Europe’s Myths of Orient Rana Kabbani takes on herself the gigantic task of deciphering misrepresentations of the East in the unique legacy of Western travel literature. Kabbani pioneers postcolonial studies by arguing that Western depiction of the Orient as the ‘sensual’ immoral ‘other’ dates back centuries prior the evolution of imperial Europe.
Kabbani is a typical metropolitan post-colonial scholar in terms of her upbringing. Her scholarly field of choice, post-colonialism, aims to show the ‘limitations’ of Eurocentric human liberalism by examining the misrepresentations of non-European cultures in Western literature and the Imperial agenda behind them. Born in Damascus at a time when her native Syria was still struggling against colonial France, Algeria fighting its Million-Martyr War against colonisation, Morocco still split between Imperial Spain and post-war France and Egypt torn between a new popular dictator and a grim British past, her family spent their time away from the hubbub of the Middle East between Djakarta and New York. She read her PhD at Cambridge and worked as a lecturer in Beirut and an art critic in Paris. Such a unique and cross-worlds profile has without doubt helped Kabbani to develop a wholistic critical eye that transgresses the tabooed geo-cultural barriers between Orient and Occident.
In her gentle but firm style, Kabbani slowly and concisely argues that the unhappy relationship between Muslim East and Christian West developed in medieval times when, through trade and interaction with Muslim Spain, the West was stricken with fear of and ignorant awe towards a civilisation that seemed in many ways its superior. These feelings threatened the West’s self-respect and in order to protect its Christian integrity the West has consciously and unconsciously developed a false portrayal of the East as loose, ‘lewd’ and ‘sensual’ with an ‘idolatrous’ faith and a ‘polygamous’ ‘impostor’ prophet. Kabbani carefully peels away layer after layer of European travelogue literature, examining the influence of each text on its contemporary culture with a brief but keen scholarly eye. The European traveller himself is also examined as a character that re-incarnates itself in different shapes but often maintaining the same supercilious Orientalist essence, in a way similar to the nature of all Oriental women in Orientalist paintings who ‘appear to be cloned from one model, as if depictions of one woman in an endless variety of poses.’ This elusive spirit of the mainly male European traveller is analysed by Kabbani as the Orientalist painter, writer, translator and creator of the controversial centuries-old Western tale of the ‘Orient.’
Kabbani acknowledges the authority of contemporary predecessors to her work in the postcolonial field, such as Said’s controversial and ground breaking Orientalism and Kiernan’s The Lords of Humankind and very briefly also leans her metaphorical back on them for support. Nevertheless her own Europe’s Myths of Orient maintains its uniqueness for being one of the pioneering critiques of European Orientalist travelogues in English and their influences on European culture. Although Kabbani’s work flows in a semi-chronological formula from medieval times onwards, Marco Polo gets mentioned only in the penultimate chapter as though he had been missed out and only got remembered towards the end.
Kabbani’s arguments are almost always either derived from texts or supported by texts. There are only two occasions within Europe’s Myths of Orient when the author’s statements seem too general and perhaps unjustified. In the introduction the author applies the premise, ‘To write a literature of travel cannot but imply a colonial relationship.’ The second occasion is when in chapter two she accepts Burton’s ‘crooked’ sexual perversions as typical in one way or another of every Victorian male. In the same chapter, Kabbani provides a superb analyses of the major translators of The Arabian Nights’ personalities and work; Galland, Lane and Burton, however Payne is entirely overlooked and passes completely unmentioned.
Rana Kabbani traces her argument all the way to modern times, including works such as An Area of Darkness (1964) and Among the Believers (1981), taking into account the misfortunes of colonised peoples in Africa, India, China and the Middle East. Europe’s Myths of Orient is a unique postcolonial, and in many ways feminist, critique of European travelogue and its influences on European and Western cultures.

According to Lane everything ‘Mohammadan’ is also Arabian. Lane lived in Egypt for several years, intermittently in the twenties and thirties of the nineteenth century. Even in Egypt he limited himself to certain Islamic quarters in Cairo and consciously avoided the other cultures and multiple heritages of one of the world’s oldest civilisations. He based his excessive annotations of A Thousand and One Nights on his culturally-limited experience in Cairo and applied them to all Islamic cultures which he described as Arabian. These notes have been put together in a separate book as a collection of essays titled Arabian Society in the Middle Ages. The notes are not helpful as descriptions of nineteenth century Eastern Mediterranean cultures (which Lane and his editor perceived as still medieval in essence), but are rather more useful in terms of understanding the picture Lane depicted to his Victorian audience of a backward and superstitious ‘Orient’.